Doug Barry

Nebraskans are being treated to the lurid details of a political sex scandal today, thanks to the Omaha World-Herald's extensive investigation into the nearly 2,000 late-night calls the State's Lieutenant Governor Rick Sheehy (R) made to four women who were most definitely not his estranged wife. On Saturday, Sheehy, who had announced his intention to run for governor just as soon as Nebraska's current governor Dave Heineman steps down in 2015, preempted the release of the investigation's results and resigned from office, his political reputation in tatters.

Reuters reports that Sheehy had been married for 28 years before his wife filed for divorce in July 2012. The World-Herald reveals that the lieutenant governor made his sexytime late-night phone calls from his state-issued cell phone over the course of four years. Governor Dave Heineman expressed his disappointment in Sheehy, whose "good work" is apparently unable to repair Heineman's broken trust in him. "Public officials," Heineman said at a news conference, "are rightly held to a higher standard."

What Heineman means, of course, is that politicians shouldn't be so cavalier with their state-issued electronic devices, since it seems pretty unlikely that there are many Americans voters who still believe that their political leaders aren't carrying on with all sorts of sordid behavior in the shadows of our fine republic.